Letter: Demonizing homeless won’t make them disappear

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Lately, in the early morning hours I’ve seen more and more solitary homeless people in wheelchairs — several outside the Jesus Center waiting for breakfast, another quietly asleep on the corner of Fifth and Mangrove. Only today have I wondered what restroom facilities were open to these beleaguered people those early hours. I hope Chico City Council members have witnessed such scenes as they discuss the need for restroom facilities for homeless people.

I’m struck now by how cockeyed our country has become. California has the most billionaires of all the states in the union. We live in a country where the three richest Americans have more net worth than the U.S. population’s lower half put together. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, 2017’s wealthiest person in the world (net worth over $100 billion, no taxes paid) almost singlehandedly convinced Seattle to rescind its surtax on the wealthy meant to build more shelter for Seattle’s homeless people. This is immoral. Google “What state has the most homeless people?” and all this shocking information will come before your eyes.

Some influential people in Chico have been “demonizing” (simply put) homeless people as if this will make them “go away.” It isn’t going to happen. With the growing disparity in wealth, homelessness is increasing everywhere. As sentient beings, we should not be demonizing the poorest of the poor. We should demonize governmental policies like tax breaks for the wealthy and cutbacks in human services. These and profligate U.S. wars have helped to impoverish America’s rank and file.